Disk Partiotioning

[Gustavo Seabra]

Hi,

Is there any way to repartition the disk AFTER installing the system? I 
tried QTParted, but it doesn't repartition ext3 filesystems.

Thansk,
Gustavo.

[Keith R. Evans]

If you use Logical Volumn manager (LVM), then you can automatically resize 
the partition. Parted is suppose to do it for you, but I do not have a lot 
of faith in the tool, so what I usually do is create a new partition with 
the size  I want, and copy the contents of the old partition to the new 
partition.  After creating the new partition, update your fstab with the new 
partition and reboot your system with the new partition replacing the old. 
You can then mount the old partition to a temporary mount point and drop it. 
Do not unmount the old because the system knows about it until the reboot 
when it will point to the new partition.  If it is not a critical partition 
like /var /boot /, /tmp, or swap, then you can just umount it and mount the 
new partition on the old mount point.

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Gustavo Seabra" 
To: 
Sent: Monday, November 22, 2004 11:30 AM
Subject: Disk Partiotioning
> Hi,
>
> Is there any way to repartition the disk AFTER installing the system? I 
> tried QTParted, but it doesn't repartition ext3 filesystems.
>
> Thansk,
> Gustavo.
> --
>
> *Gustavo Seabra*
> http://www.ksu.edu/chem/personnel/faculty/grad/jvo/ortiz/people_seabra.html
> Graduate Student
>
> E-Mail: [e-mail] 
> Phone: [phone] Chemistry Department http://www.ksu.edu/chem/
> Kansas State University http://www.ksu.edu
> Manhattan, KS 66506-3701
>
> -- 
> fedora-list mailing list
> [e-mail]
> To unsubscribe: http://www.redhat.com/mailman/listinfo/fedora-list

[Gustavo Seabra]

Keith R. Evans wrote:
> If you use Logical Volumn manager (LVM), then you can automatically 
> resize the partition. Parted is suppose to do it for you, but I do not 
> have a lot of faith in the tool, so what I usually do is create a new 
> partition with the size  I want, and copy the contents of the old 
> partition to the new partition.  After creating the new partition, 
> update your fstab with the new partition and reboot your system with 
> the new partition replacing the old. You can then mount the old 
> partition to a temporary mount point and drop it. Do not unmount the 
> old because the system knows about it until the reboot when it will 
> point to the new partition.  If it is not a critical partition like 
> /var /boot /, /tmp, or swap, then you can just umount it and mount the 
> new partition on the old mount point.
>
> ----- Original Message ----- From: "Gustavo Seabra" 
> To: 
> Sent: Monday, November 22, 2004 11:30 AM
> Subject: Disk Partiotioning
> > Hi,
> >
> > Is there any way to repartition the disk AFTER installing the system? 
> > I tried QTParted, but it doesn't repartition ext3 filesystems.
> >
> > Thansk,
> > Gustavo.
> > --
> >
> > *Gustavo Seabra*
> > http://www.ksu.edu/chem/personnel/faculty/grad/jvo/ortiz/people_seabra.html
> > Graduate Student
> >
> > E-Mail: [e-mail] 
> > Phone: [phone] Chemistry Department http://www.ksu.edu/chem/
> > Kansas State University http://www.ksu.edu
> > Manhattan, KS 66506-3701
> >
> > -- 
> > fedora-list mailing list
> > [e-mail]
> > To unsubscribe: http://www.redhat.com/mailman/listinfo/fedora-list

That was my second mistake ;-) I didn't use LVM... The way I saw it is, 
since I only have one HD, why should I need LVM? Now, from your post, it 
seems that LVM has advantages even for single HD, is that right?

By the way, since I didn't use LVM, and wat to increase the size of / 
(root) taking space from /home, am I just screwed?

Thanks,
            Gustavo.

[C. Linus Hicks]

On Mon, 2004-11-22 at 10:47 -0600, Gustavo Seabra wrote:
> That was my second mistake ;-) I didn't use LVM... The way I saw it is, 
> since I only have one HD, why should I need LVM? Now, from your post, it 
> seems that LVM has advantages even for single HD, is that right?
>
> By the way, since I didn't use LVM, and wat to increase the size of / 
> (root) taking space from /home, am I just screwed?

Not necessarilly, it depends mostly on your partition layout. What
partitions have you defined - please give device (disk) names and mount
points.

If you are in a situation where you can either temporarily delete a
partition after having backed it up, or shrink an existing one to create
a new one, then you should have some options available to you.

Do a "man resize2fs" and read that.

[Gustavo Seabra]

C. Linus Hicks wrote:
> On Mon, 2004-11-22 at 10:47 -0600, Gustavo Seabra wrote:
> > That was my second mistake ;-) I didn't use LVM... The way I saw it is, 
> > since I only have one HD, why should I need LVM? Now, from your post, it 
> > seems that LVM has advantages even for single HD, is that right?
> >
> > By the way, since I didn't use LVM, and wat to increase the size of / 
> > (root) taking space from /home, am I just screwed?
>
> Not necessarilly, it depends mostly on your partition layout. What
> partitions have you defined - please give device (disk) names and mount
> points.
>
> If you are in a situation where you can either temporarily delete a
> partition after having backed it up, or shrink an existing one to create
> a new one, then you should have some options available to you.
>
> Do a "man resize2fs" and read that.

Thanks. I'm not at the computer I want to change now but, as soon as I 
get there (probably tonight) I'll check this and send to you. Thanks!

Gustavo.

[Gustavo Seabra]

C. Linus Hicks wrote:
> On Mon, 2004-11-22 at 10:47 -0600, Gustavo Seabra wrote:
> > That was my second mistake ;-) I didn't use LVM... The way I saw it is, 
> > since I only have one HD, why should I need LVM? Now, from your post, it 
> > seems that LVM has advantages even for single HD, is that right?
> >
> > By the way, since I didn't use LVM, and wat to increase the size of / 
> > (root) taking space from /home, am I just screwed?
>
> Not necessarilly, it depends mostly on your partition layout. What
> partitions have you defined - please give device (disk) names and mount
> points.
>
> If you are in a situation where you can either temporarily delete a
> partition after having backed it up, or shrink an existing one to create
> a new one, then you should have some options available to you.
>
> Do a "man resize2fs" and read that.

Sorry, I just found a way to get the info. Here is the result of df -h:
Filesystem            Size  Used Avail Use% Mounted on
/dev/sda3             4.9G  4.2G  427M  91% /
/dev/sda1              99M   17M   78M  18% /boot
none                  125M     0  125M   0% /dev/shm
/dev/sda2              12G  683M   11G   7% /home

What I'd like to do is to take a couple of Gigs from /home and put them 
into / (root). I believe I can backup and erase /home without problems, 
but how can I put this space into root?

Thanks

[C. Linus Hicks]

On Mon, 2004-11-22 at 11:46 -0600, Gustavo Seabra wrote:
> Sorry, I just found a way to get the info. Here is the result of df -h:
> Filesystem            Size  Used Avail Use% Mounted on
> /dev/sda3             4.9G  4.2G  427M  91% /
> /dev/sda1              99M   17M   78M  18% /boot
> none                  125M     0  125M   0% /dev/shm
> /dev/sda2              12G  683M   11G   7% /home
>
> What I'd like to do is to take a couple of Gigs from /home and put them 
> into / (root). I believe I can backup and erase /home without problems, 
> but how can I put this space into root?

I'd like to see the output of the "p" command from fdisk also, but this
will be a somewhat complicated case. Since your root partition comes
after your /home partition, you will have to move the contents of your
root partition in order to make it bigger. It is doable, just more
complicated. You decide whether the potential risk is worth it.

There are two posibilities dependent on whether or not you are able to
backup your /home partition to off-line storage, like burning a CD.

Here's the basic outline if you can backup /home:

1. Back up your home partition.
2. Unmount /home and remove it (comment it out) from your fstab.
3. Delete the sda2 partition.
4. Create a new sda2 the size your new root partition should be.
5. Copy everything in sda3 to sda2.
6. Make a new entry in your grub.conf pointing to the new root. Be sure
to preserve your existing entry in the grub menu.
7. Test to make sure you can boot the new root partition. Use the mount
command to verify what device is mounted as your root partition. Make
sure the system works properly - just remember you have no /home.
8. Assuming you booted successfully from the new root, you can now
delete sda3 and create any new partitions you want, including your
new /home.
9. Restore /home from your backup.
10. Update your fstab to reflect your new /home partition.

The above can be simplified if you like the existing paritions sizes and
just want to switch them.

Here's the outline if you can't backup /home:

1. Unmount /home.
2. Use resize2fs to shrink the filesystem. I would shrink it to the size
you want your new root to be.
3. Use fdisk to shrink the parition.
4. Decide how to proceed:

The safer way to proceed from here is to leave what is currently in your
sda2 partition there, and just copy your root partition from sda3 into
sda2 as well. Note that this will consolidate everything (except /boot)
into one partition. You will want to create a /home/home directory and
move all your user directories into it first. This will allow you to
boot both new and old roots, but will alter disk allocation patterns
(this should have a negligible negative effect). From here, it remains
to create a new grub entry, test booting the new root, then deleting
your old root, creating your new /home, then moving /home in your root
partition to your new /home partition.

The risker way to proceed is to go ahead and create a new partition
for /home and move it first. The risk here is that you must modify both
you grub.conf and your fstab for your existing root in order to boot it
successfully. The reason is that your partition names have changed
because you now have two where there used to be one. So sda3 becomes
sda4, your new /home is sda3 and your new root is sda2.

I have not outlined the rest of this process, but this much should give
you an idea of the risk should you decide to proceed with it. If you are
not comfortable with using resize2fs and/or fdisk, the potential for
damaging your system beyond repair could be great. On the other hand, it
could be a great learning opportunity.

[Kevin Cummings]

Gustavo Seabra wrote:
> C. Linus Hicks wrote:
> > On Mon, 2004-11-22 at 10:47 -0600, Gustavo Seabra wrote:
> > > That was my second mistake ;-) I didn't use LVM... The way I saw it 
> > > is, since I only have one HD, why should I need LVM? Now, from your 
> > > post, it seems that LVM has advantages even for single HD, is that 
> > > right?
> > >
> > > By the way, since I didn't use LVM, and wat to increase the size of / 
> > > (root) taking space from /home, am I just screwed?
> >
> > Not necessarilly, it depends mostly on your partition layout. What
> > partitions have you defined - please give device (disk) names and mount
> > points.
> >
> > If you are in a situation where you can either temporarily delete a
> > partition after having backed it up, or shrink an existing one to create
> > a new one, then you should have some options available to you.
> >
> > Do a "man resize2fs" and read that.
>
> Sorry, I just found a way to get the info. Here is the result of df -h:
> Filesystem            Size  Used Avail Use% Mounted on
> /dev/sda3             4.9G  4.2G  427M  91% /
> /dev/sda1              99M   17M   78M  18% /boot
> none                  125M     0  125M   0% /dev/shm
> /dev/sda2              12G  683M   11G   7% /home

Instead of "df -h", "fdisk -l" would have been more useful.  We want to 
see the actual partition layout of the partition table....
> What I'd like to do is to take a couple of Gigs from /home and put them 
> into / (root). I believe I can backup and erase /home without problems, 
> but how can I put this space into root?

*IF* sda2 and sda3 are contiguous in the partition table (probably, but 
not guarenteed without looking at the actual allocation info) you might 
be able to resize(move) sda3 to the upper regions, re-size the partition 
sda3, then merge the new space onto the end of sda2.  If you are lucky, 
you should then be able to expand sda2 into the re-claimed space.  Not 
easy, but it should be straightforward if you know the right commands.
If you have no experience doing this, I'd heartily recommend backing up 
the data in both sda2 & sda3 before attempting this for a first time!
> Thanks

Good Luck!

[Gustavo Seabra]

Kevin J. Cummings wrote:
> Gustavo Seabra wrote:
> > C. Linus Hicks wrote:
> > > On Mon, 2004-11-22 at 10:47 -0600, Gustavo Seabra wrote:
> > > > That was my second mistake ;-) I didn't use LVM... The way I saw it 
> > > > is, since I only have one HD, why should I need LVM? Now, from your 
> > > > post, it seems that LVM has advantages even for single HD, is that 
> > > > right?
> > > >
> > > > By the way, since I didn't use LVM, and wat to increase the size of 
> > > > / (root) taking space from /home, am I just screwed?
> > >
> > > Not necessarilly, it depends mostly on your partition layout. What
> > > partitions have you defined - please give device (disk) names and mount
> > > points.
> > >
> > > If you are in a situation where you can either temporarily delete a
> > > partition after having backed it up, or shrink an existing one to 
> > > create
> > > a new one, then you should have some options available to you.
> > >
> > > Do a "man resize2fs" and read that.
> >
> > Sorry, I just found a way to get the info. Here is the result of df -h:
> > Filesystem            Size  Used Avail Use% Mounted on
> > /dev/sda3             4.9G  4.2G  427M  91% /
> > /dev/sda1              99M   17M   78M  18% /boot
> > none                  125M     0  125M   0% /dev/shm
> > /dev/sda2              12G  683M   11G   7% /home
>
> Instead of "df -h", "fdisk -l" would have been more useful.  We want 
> to see the actual partition layout of the partition table....
> > What I'd like to do is to take a couple of Gigs from /home and put 
> > them into / (root). I believe I can backup and erase /home without 
> > problems, but how can I put this space into root?
>
> *IF* sda2 and sda3 are contiguous in the partition table (probably, 
> but not guarenteed without looking at the actual allocation info) you 
> might be able to resize(move) sda3 to the upper regions, re-size the 
> partition sda3, then merge the new space onto the end of sda2.  If you 
> are lucky, you should then be able to expand sda2 into the re-claimed 
> space.  Not easy, but it should be straightforward if you know the 
> right commands.
> If you have no experience doing this, I'd heartily recommend backing 
> up the data in both sda2 & sda3 before attempting this for a first time!
> > Thanks
>
> Good Luck!

Thanks for you reply, and sorry it took me so long to answer. It took me 
some time to realize I needed the - in the su command to get this to 
work. But here it is:
[root@patroclus ~]# fdisk -l

Disk /dev/sda: 18.2 GB, 18210037760 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 2213 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes

Device Boot      Start         End      Blocks   Id  System
/dev/sda1   *           1          13      104391   83  Linux
/dev/sda2              14        1511    12032685   83  Linux
/dev/sda3            1512        2148     5116702+  83  Linux
/dev/sda4            2149        2213      522112+   5  Extended
/dev/sda5            2149        2213      522081   82  Linux swap

[Jeff Vian]

On Mon, 2004-11-29 at 06:32 -0600, Gustavo Seabra wrote:
> Kevin J. Cummings wrote:
> > Gustavo Seabra wrote:
> > > C. Linus Hicks wrote:
> > > > On Mon, 2004-11-22 at 10:47 -0600, Gustavo Seabra wrote:
> > > > > That was my second mistake ;-) I didn't use LVM... The way I saw it 
> > > > > is, since I only have one HD, why should I need LVM? Now, from your 
> > > > > post, it seems that LVM has advantages even for single HD, is that 
> > > > > right?
> > > > >
> > > > > By the way, since I didn't use LVM, and wat to increase the size of 
> > > > > / (root) taking space from /home, am I just screwed?
> > > >
> > > > Not necessarilly, it depends mostly on your partition layout. What
> > > > partitions have you defined - please give device (disk) names and mount
> > > > points.
> > > >
> > > > If you are in a situation where you can either temporarily delete a
> > > > partition after having backed it up, or shrink an existing one to 
> > > > create
> > > > a new one, then you should have some options available to you.
> > > >
> > > > Do a "man resize2fs" and read that.
> > >
> > > Sorry, I just found a way to get the info. Here is the result of df -h:
> > > Filesystem            Size  Used Avail Use% Mounted on
> > > /dev/sda3             4.9G  4.2G  427M  91% /
> > > /dev/sda1              99M   17M   78M  18% /boot
> > > none                  125M     0  125M   0% /dev/shm
> > > /dev/sda2              12G  683M   11G   7% /home
> >
> > Instead of "df -h", "fdisk -l" would have been more useful.  We want 
> > to see the actual partition layout of the partition table....
> > > What I'd like to do is to take a couple of Gigs from /home and put 
> > > them into / (root). I believe I can backup and erase /home without 
> > > problems, but how can I put this space into root?
> >
> > *IF* sda2 and sda3 are contiguous in the partition table (probably, 
> > but not guarenteed without looking at the actual allocation info) you 
> > might be able to resize(move) sda3 to the upper regions, re-size the 
> > partition sda3, then merge the new space onto the end of sda2.  If you 
> > are lucky, you should then be able to expand sda2 into the re-claimed 
> > space.  Not easy, but it should be straightforward if you know the 
> > right commands.
> > If you have no experience doing this, I'd heartily recommend backing 
> > up the data in both sda2 & sda3 before attempting this for a first time!
> > > Thanks
> >
> > Good Luck!
>
> Thanks for you reply, and sorry it took me so long to answer. It took me 
> some time to realize I needed the - in the su command to get this to 
> work. But here it is:
> [root@patroclus ~]# fdisk -l
>
> Disk /dev/sda: 18.2 GB, 18210037760 bytes
> 255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 2213 cylinders
> Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes
>
> Device Boot      Start         End      Blocks   Id  System
> /dev/sda1   *           1          13      104391   83  Linux
> /dev/sda2              14        1511    12032685   83  Linux
> /dev/sda3            1512        2148     5116702+  83  Linux
> /dev/sda4            2149        2213      522112+   5  Extended
> /dev/sda5            2149        2213      522081   82  Linux swap

Looking at this information and your request above, I would recommend
the following.

1. Backup anything in the / partition that you want to keep. This
includes config files, customizations, mail, web site data, etc.

If you want to do a full backup/restore you may be able to do that by
using tar and creating a file in /home of all the data in / (but not
including /home and space permitting)

2. Boot from some live distro such as knoppix, and use qtparted to
resize sda2 smaller by the amount you want.
Then remove and recreate sda3 to fill the new larger space.

3. Reinstall, or restore the data for sda3.

These 3 steps should handle what you are asking for

[Gustavo Seabra]

Jeff Vian wrote:
> On Mon, 2004-11-29 at 06:32 -0600, Gustavo Seabra wrote:
> > Kevin J. Cummings wrote:
> > > Gustavo Seabra wrote:
> > > > C. Linus Hicks wrote:
> > > > > On Mon, 2004-11-22 at 10:47 -0600, Gustavo Seabra wrote:
> > > > > > That was my second mistake ;-) I didn't use LVM... The way I saw it 
> > > > > > is, since I only have one HD, why should I need LVM? Now, from your 
> > > > > > post, it seems that LVM has advantages even for single HD, is that 
> > > > > > right?
> > > > > >
> > > > > > By the way, since I didn't use LVM, and wat to increase the size of 
> > > > > > / (root) taking space from /home, am I just screwed?
> > > > >
> > > > > Not necessarilly, it depends mostly on your partition layout. What
> > > > > partitions have you defined - please give device (disk) names and mount
> > > > > points.
> > > > >
> > > > > If you are in a situation where you can either temporarily delete a
> > > > > partition after having backed it up, or shrink an existing one to 
> > > > > create
> > > > > a new one, then you should have some options available to you.
> > > > >
> > > > > Do a "man resize2fs" and read that.
> > > >
> > > > Sorry, I just found a way to get the info. Here is the result of df -h:
> > > > Filesystem            Size  Used Avail Use% Mounted on
> > > > /dev/sda3             4.9G  4.2G  427M  91% /
> > > > /dev/sda1              99M   17M   78M  18% /boot
> > > > none                  125M     0  125M   0% /dev/shm
> > > > /dev/sda2              12G  683M   11G   7% /home
> > >
> > > Instead of "df -h", "fdisk -l" would have been more useful.  We want 
> > > to see the actual partition layout of the partition table....
> > > > What I'd like to do is to take a couple of Gigs from /home and put 
> > > > them into / (root). I believe I can backup and erase /home without 
> > > > problems, but how can I put this space into root?
> > >
> > > *IF* sda2 and sda3 are contiguous in the partition table (probably, 
> > > but not guarenteed without looking at the actual allocation info) you 
> > > might be able to resize(move) sda3 to the upper regions, re-size the 
> > > partition sda3, then merge the new space onto the end of sda2.  If you 
> > > are lucky, you should then be able to expand sda2 into the re-claimed 
> > > space.  Not easy, but it should be straightforward if you know the 
> > > right commands.
> > > If you have no experience doing this, I'd heartily recommend backing 
> > > up the data in both sda2 & sda3 before attempting this for a first time!
> > > > Thanks
> > >
> > > Good Luck!
> >
> > Thanks for you reply, and sorry it took me so long to answer. It took me 
> > some time to realize I needed the - in the su command to get this to 
> > work. But here it is:
> > [root@patroclus ~]# fdisk -l
> >
> > Disk /dev/sda: 18.2 GB, 18210037760 bytes
> > 255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 2213 cylinders
> > Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes
> >
> > Device Boot      Start         End      Blocks   Id  System
> > /dev/sda1   *           1          13      104391   83  Linux
> > /dev/sda2              14        1511    12032685   83  Linux
> > /dev/sda3            1512        2148     5116702+  83  Linux
> > /dev/sda4            2149        2213      522112+   5  Extended
> > /dev/sda5            2149        2213      522081   82  Linux swap
>
> Looking at this information and your request above, I would recommend
> the following.
> Backup anything in the / partition that you want to keep. This
>
> includes config files, customizations, mail, web site data, etc.
>
> If you want to do a full backup/restore you may be able to do that by
> using tar and creating a file in /home of all the data in / (but not
> including /home and space permitting)
> Boot from some live distro such as knoppix, and use qtparted to
>
> resize sda2 smaller by the amount you want.
> Then remove and recreate sda3 to fill the new larger space.
> Reinstall, or restore the data for sda3.
>
> These 3 steps should handle what you are asking for

Thanks Jeff,

All would work perfectly if it wasn;t for one detail: QTParted doesn't 
resize ext3 partitions, as all of my partitions (but swap) are. So, I'm 
starting to believe that, if I want more space in root, I'll really have 
to reinstall the system.

Thanks,

[Robert P. J. Day]

On Wed, 1 Dec 2004, Gustavo Seabra wrote:

MASSIVE snip here ...
> All would work perfectly if it wasn;t for one detail: QTParted
> doesn't resize ext3 partitions, as all of my partitions (but swap)
> are. So, I'm starting to believe that, if I want more space in root,
> I'll really have to reinstall the system.

from the snip, your root partition is almost 5G(!) in size, and 91%
full, while there's lots of room left in /home.  for now, if you want
to do this less painfully, just leave that filesystem alone and figure
out what parts you can move out of there (/tmp, /var, and so on). then
make the /home filesystem smaller and *create* a new filesystem or two
in the freed-up space, and remount.

it's not the optimal solution (really, the root filesystem should be
at most 512M with lots of additional filesystems taking care of the
rest), but for now, trying the above is fairly easy and doesn't
involve messing with the root filesystem.

rday

[C. Linus Hicks]

On Wed, 2004-12-01 at 10:19 -0600, Gustavo Seabra wrote:
> All would work perfectly if it wasn;t for one detail: QTParted doesn't 
> resize ext3 partitions, as all of my partitions (but swap) are. So, I'm 
> starting to believe that, if I want more space in root, I'll really have 
> to reinstall the system.

So turn off the journal. Read the tune2fs manpage.

[Gustavo Seabra]

C. Linus Hicks wrote:
> On Wed, 2004-12-01 at 10:19 -0600, Gustavo Seabra wrote:
> > All would work perfectly if it wasn;t for one detail: QTParted doesn't 
> > resize ext3 partitions, as all of my partitions (but swap) are. So, I'm 
> > starting to believe that, if I want more space in root, I'll really have 
> > to reinstall the system.
>
> So turn off the journal. Read the tune2fs manpage.

What do you mean by "turn off the journal"?

[C. Linus Hicks]

On Wed, 2004-12-01 at 13:28 -0600, Gustavo Seabra wrote:
> C. Linus Hicks wrote:
> > On Wed, 2004-12-01 at 10:19 -0600, Gustavo Seabra wrote:
> > > All would work perfectly if it wasn;t for one detail: QTParted doesn't 
> > > resize ext3 partitions, as all of my partitions (but swap) are. So, I'm 
> > > starting to believe that, if I want more space in root, I'll really have 
> > > to reinstall the system.
> >
> > So turn off the journal. Read the tune2fs manpage.
>
> What do you mean by "turn off the journal"?

The only difference between an ext2 filesystem and ext3 is that the ext3
has a journal. Turn off the journal and you have an ext2 filesystem. The
tune2fs manpage tells you how to do that. If you don't trust that on one
of your live filesystems, experiment by creating a new filesystem (you
don't have to have a free disk partition to do this, you can do it with
a filesystem in a file) and make sure you know what you are doing before
doing it for real. After you finish resizing, you can turn the journal
back on and convert back to ext3.

Note that you can only turn the journal off when the filesystem is not
mounted or mounted read-only, so you will have to do that using a rescue
CD or some such.

[Gustavo Seabra]

C. Linus Hicks wrote:
> On Wed, 2004-12-01 at 13:28 -0600, Gustavo Seabra wrote:
> > C. Linus Hicks wrote:
> > > On Wed, 2004-12-01 at 10:19 -0600, Gustavo Seabra wrote:
> > > > All would work perfectly if it wasn;t for one detail: QTParted doesn't 
> > > > resize ext3 partitions, as all of my partitions (but swap) are. So, I'm 
> > > > starting to believe that, if I want more space in root, I'll really have 
> > > > to reinstall the system.
> > >
> > > So turn off the journal. Read the tune2fs manpage.
> >
> > What do you mean by "turn off the journal"?
>
> The only difference between an ext2 filesystem and ext3 is that the ext3
> has a journal. Turn off the journal and you have an ext2 filesystem. The
> tune2fs manpage tells you how to do that. If you don't trust that on one
> of your live filesystems, experiment by creating a new filesystem (you
> don't have to have a free disk partition to do this, you can do it with
> a filesystem in a file) and make sure you know what you are doing before
> doing it for real. After you finish resizing, you can turn the journal
> back on and convert back to ext3.
>
> Note that you can only turn the journal off when the filesystem is not
> mounted or mounted read-only, so you will have to do that using a rescue
> CD or some such.

How do I make a "filesystem in a file" ?

I also had a couple of problems: I backed up everything in my "/" 
partition inside /home. Then I tried booting with the System Rescue CD 
or Knoppix. In the first, I couldn't access any of my permanent 
partitions. In the second, I could only mount them as "read-only", so I 
would not be able to restore the "/" partition after resizing it, or 
would I? I mean, I must be able to read/write there after I re-create 
it, don't I? And how am I going to define the mount point as "/" after 
re-creating it?

You see, I still have a lot to learn. I'm starting to believe that this 
is just too much for my present knowledge, and maybe I should just 
"patch" things up with symlinks to somewhere in /home, at least untill 
it's time to reinstall the whole system again... (I should probably do 
it in about a year max.)

[John Summerfield]

On Thursday 02 December 2004 10:59, Gustavo Seabra wrote:
> How do I make a "filesystem in a file" ?

I'll answer first: mine's best:-)

dd if=/dev/zero of=bigfile count=0 seek=$((4*1024)) bs=$((1024*1024))
ls -Shosag bigfile
mke2fs -q -F bigfile
ls -Shossag bigfile
sudo mount -o loop bigfile /mnt

The last assumes you have sudo installed and configured.

You could, of course, mount it over /tmp and Bob's your uncle:-)

Be aware that this is a little more frail than a filesystem on a partition: 
you have two layers of stuff to write. It's good for
1) Short-term stuff
2) Throw-away stuff. Like /tmp.
3) ro stuff. Like /usr - just back it up each time you change it.
4) Self-education.

btw I created an ext2 filesystem like that, populated it and burned to to dvd.

[Ow Mun Heng]

On Thu, 2004-12-02 at 10:59, Gustavo Seabra wrote:
> C. Linus Hicks wrote:
> > On Wed, 2004-12-01 at 13:28 -0600, Gustavo Seabra wrote:
> > > C. Linus Hicks wrote:
> > > > On Wed, 2004-12-01 at 10:19 -0600, Gustavo Seabra wrote:
> > > > > All would work perfectly if it wasn;t for one detail: QTParted doesn't 
> > > > > resize ext3 partitions, as all of my partitions (but swap) are. So, I'm 
> > > > > starting to believe that, if I want more space in root, I'll really have 
> > > > > to reinstall the system.
> > > >
> > > > So turn off the journal. Read the tune2fs manpage.
> > >
> > > What do you mean by "turn off the journal"?
> >
> > The only difference between an ext2 filesystem and ext3 is that the ext3
> > has a journal. Turn off the journal and you have an ext2 filesystem. The
> > tune2fs manpage tells you how to do that. If you don't trust that on one
> > of your live filesystems, experiment by creating a new filesystem (you
> > don't have to have a free disk partition to do this, you can do it with
> > a filesystem in a file) and make sure you know what you are doing before
> > doing it for real. After you finish resizing, you can turn the journal
> > back on and convert back to ext3.
> >
> > Note that you can only turn the journal off when the filesystem is not
> > mounted or mounted read-only, so you will have to do that using a rescue
> > CD or some such.
>
> How do I make a "filesystem in a file" ?
>
> I also had a couple of problems: I backed up everything in my "/" 
> partition inside /home. Then I tried booting with the System Rescue CD 
> or Knoppix. In the first, I couldn't access any of my permanent 
> partitions.

Are they mounted??

check 
$mount
> In the second, I could only mount them as "read-only",

you can remount it read - write
$ mount -o remount,rw /path/to/mount
> so I 
> would not be able to restore the "/" partition after resizing it, or 
> would I? I mean, I must be able to read/write there after I re-create 
> it, don't I? 
> And how am I going to define the mount point as "/" after 
> re-creating it?

I don't follow. (actually I did't follow the thread)

if you're booted into Knoppix or the rescue-cd, just fire up

vim /mnt/???/etc/fstab

edit the line that says which is your "/" partition to point to the new
place where your "/" resides.
> You see, I still have a lot to learn. I'm starting to believe that this 
> is just too much for my present knowledge,

Experience is the best teacher, but if you don't start, experience won't
come a-running.
> and maybe I should just 
> "patch" things up with symlinks to somewhere in /home, at least untill 
> it's time to reinstall the whole system again... (I should probably do 
> it in about a year max.)
> --
>
> Gustavo Seabra - Graduate Student
> Chemistry Department
> Kansas State University

--
Ow Mun Heng
Gentoo/Linux on D600 1.4Ghz 
Neuromancer 11:27:11 up 1:38, 6 users, 0.09, 0.15, 0.26

[Jorge Fábregas]

On Wednesday 01 December 2004 10:59 pm, Gustavo Seabra wrote:
> How do I make a "filesystem in a file" ?

Read this nice article:  "Building A Linux Filesystem From An Ordinary File"
http://freshmeat.net/articles/view/1387/

[C. Linus Hicks]

On Wed, 2004-12-01 at 20:59 -0600, Gustavo Seabra wrote:
> How do I make a "filesystem in a file" ?

Here's one way:

# touch filesys
# mke2fs -j ./filesys 4000
mke2fs 1.35 (28-Feb-2004)
./filesys is not a block special device.
Proceed anyway? (y,n) y
mke2fs: Filesystem larger than apparent device size.
Proceed anyway? (y,n) y
max_blocks 4096000, rsv_groups = 500, rsv_gdb = 15
Filesystem label=
OS type: Linux
Block size=1024 (log=0)
Fragment size=1024 (log=0)
504 inodes, 4000 blocks
200 blocks (5.00%) reserved for the super user
First data block=1
Maximum filesystem blocks=4194304
1 block group
8192 blocks per group, 8192 fragments per group
504 inodes per group

Writing inode tables: done                            
inode.i_blocks = 32, i_size = 67383296
Creating journal (1024 blocks): done
Writing superblocks and filesystem accounting information: done

This filesystem will be automatically checked every 26 mounts or
180 days, whichever comes first.  Use tune2fs -c or -i to override.
# ls -l filesys
-rw-r--r--  1 root root 4096000 Dec  1 15:11 filesys
# mount ./filesys /mnt/img -o loop

Now you can create files in your new filesystem, play with it, then
unmount it and turn off journaling. Mount it again and verify that all
your files are okay. Once you have done this, you have gained some
experience and can do it with other filesystems.

Actually, this won't solve your problem with QTparted. It doesn't
support resizing ext3 or ext2 filesystems. And from playing around with
parted, I think you would run into "Filesystem has incompatible feature
enabled" errors if you tried using it.

I think your best bet on resizing is my original suggestion. Use
resize2fs to resize the filesystem, then use fdisk to resize the
partition.

[Robert]

C. Linus Hicks wrote:

<snip>
> Actually, this won't solve your problem with QTparted. It doesn't
> support resizing ext3 or ext2 filesystems. And from playing around with
> parted, I think you would run into "Filesystem has incompatible feature
> enabled" errors if you tried using it.

Because, as I learned a few months ago, the filesystem was created with 
"sparse superblocks", which is the default behavior.  A workaround is to 
always include -O ^sparse_super in the options string for mke2fs. The 
partition will then be resizable by parted, qtparted or Partition Magic. 
A bit more disk space is consumed in overhead but at today's storage 
costs, I really couldn't care less.  YMMV
> I think your best bet on resizing is my original suggestion. Use
> resize2fs to resize the filesystem, then use fdisk to resize the
> partition.

[Gustavo Seabra]

Robert wrote:
> C. Linus Hicks wrote:
>
> <snip>
> > Actually, this won't solve your problem with QTparted. It doesn't
> > support resizing ext3 or ext2 filesystems. And from playing around with
> > parted, I think you would run into "Filesystem has incompatible feature
> > enabled" errors if you tried using it.
>
> Because, as I learned a few months ago, the filesystem was created 
> with "sparse superblocks", which is the default behavior.  A 
> workaround is to always include -O ^sparse_super in the options string 
> for mke2fs. The partition will then be resizable by parted, qtparted 
> or Partition Magic. A bit more disk space is consumed in overhead but 
> at today's storage costs, I really couldn't care less.  YMMV

I only wish I could have done it before ;-)